The Inquisitor
by deathwing17
Summary: After preventing a Chaos warband from summoning a vast army onto an Imperial world, an Inquisitor in training is hurtled through the warp and finds himself in a strange new world, one in which there are people with incredible abilities. Soon he will find himself fighting a familiar enemy and in order to save mankind he will need to cast aside old prejudices.
1. Beyond the Warp

The Inquisitor

Chapter 1

Beyond the Warp

A/N: There is a cameo appearance of Lord-Of-Change's OC from the Death Korps of Justice, this is done with Lord-Of-Change's permission. Also for anyone that may be getting the wrong idea about this fic, this is not a carbon copy of his or her fanfic, rather I was inspired to write this from that fanfic, and as a final note there will be more than a literal ton of differences from Lord-Of-Change's story. And for those who are going to end up reading this I would appreciate it if you would please leave some feedback on how I can make the story better.

Also just as a quick warning, this chapter does get pretty bloody Warhammer 40k style.

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-Patronus, Civilized World, Ultima Segmentum, Subsector: Euphrates-

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For the past four millennia the people who had lived in the Euphrates subsector had existed in a period of relative calm and quiet. The subsector itself had little strategic value aside from a single forge world, and several civilized and agri worlds. On the civilized world of Patronus this would soon change, as a series of disturbing killings had taken place throughout the planet's capital city.

Several victims had been found with their throats torn open with a jagged knife and their organs removed. Many amongst the planet's populace had at first suspected that the killings were done by a Chaos cult. Initially these rumors were completely unfounded as the planet had no history of Chaos incursions since it was settled.

Instead the authorities believed that this was more than likely the work of either a deranged mass murderer or an organization that dealt with black market organ trade (I'm not sure if the black market even exists in the Warhammer 'verse but just roll with it here). At least that was what many had thought until the tenth victim had been found.

A group of young warehouse workers had been working late one night and all of them had heard a series of strange noises coming from one of the buildings that sounded suspiciously like screaming. With no small amount of courage, the workers went to investigate the screams but by the time they had arrived the screams had stopped and gruesome spectacle was waiting for them.

A young woman was chained to a table with several figures in black cloaks hanging over her, one of which held a jagged knife in his hands and had already sliced open her throat and had just begun to start cutting open the young woman's flesh.

The workers immediately ran to try and find help. Eventually they came back with a small group of the Adeptus Arbites who had been making an arrest nearby of a man who was being taken in for questioning in regards to possible connections with several criminal organizations.

When the Arbites entered the warehouse they found that the foul ritual was still in progress. Their victim was already dead but the cultists had apparently been trying to use the woman as a sacrifice so they could use some sort of sorcery, but for what purpose the Arbites didn't know and didn't care. These heretics had committed the greatest sin a human could commit, they consorted with the ruinous powers.

The Arbites immediately engaged the cultists and quickly gunned many of them down before they could even react to their presence. The ones that managed to survive the initial attack opened fire with what weapons they had, mainly a variety of autogun weaponry and scored several lucky hits against the Arbites who responded by redoubling their efforts to kill the cultists. Soon all but one of the remaining cultists were soon gunned down in a large volley of gunfire.

Despite the fact that the cultist had lost most of his blood and despite the fact that he had been practically eviscerated by a shotgun blast just below the chest he spoke calmly and coherently. The very last words that came out of his mouth before he decided to shove a ceremonial dagger into his jugular artery were "The servants of the Dark Gods will soon engulf this world, and there is nothing you can do to stop it!"

Needless to say, word of this encounter soon reached the ears of members of the Inquisition. Two inquisitors, one representing the Ordo Malleus who was known as Elias Monroe while the other representing the Ordo Hereticus known as Mena Rogan arrived on Patronus along with their retinues and commenced their investigation of the planet. Shortly after the inquisitors arrived the Cult that the Arbites had encountered had begun to step up their activities. It seemed as though the time for subtlety had long since passed.

Soon massive riots broke out all across the planet but it soon became clear that these weren't some random dissidents unsatisfied with the status quo. Instead it was a highly organized army of cultists that had managed to get themselves ahold of weapons that would normally be found in the Imperial Guard's possession. This meant that not only did the cult have an effective commander but they also had access to the Planetary Defense Force's (PDF) weapons as well, which suggested that they had people on the inside of the planetary government.

To make matters even worse the cultists managed to use their inside sources to allow them to capture a PDF supply base almost effortlessly. Once inside they captured many PDF troopers and sacrificed them to open a relatively small and temporary Warp Gate, which allowed a Word Bearers Chaos Space Marine Warband into Patronus. The Word Bearers slaughtered whomever had not yet pledged service to the dark gods or captured them to use them as sacrificial offerings to the ruinous powers.

It was at this point that the Inquisitors decided to call in their support forces and retinues as the PDF and planetary government could no longer be trustworthy at this point. While Inquisitor Mena preferred to work with a limited support force as she felt that it allowed her to better investigate without drawing too much attention. She did however keep several squads of Adepta Sororitas and almost a platoon's worth of Storm Troopers in reserve should things require less covert methods.

Inquisitor Elias however, used his resources so that he could call upon several squads of the Grey Knights chapter of the Adeptus Astartes, and several platoons' worth of Storm Troopers if necessary. He also brought his personal retinue that consisted of Marcus Ryder, a mercenary that was also a man of faith. Ryder had pledged himself to Monroe's service after the Inquisitor saved his life on the hive world of Indomita that had come under attack by the forces of Chaos. Ryder was a man in his late twenties, he had slicked back black hair, blue eyes.

Silas Mahan, a sanctioned psyker that was born to a hive world and had been recruited after he single handedly prevented a number of Chaos daemons from entering a cathedral filled with terrified civilians by using his powers. Captain Connor McNeal was the leader of a Cadian Kasrkin squad before his talents were put to better use as a captain in the Inquisitorial Storm Troopers.

Silas was a man approaching sixty years of age, his head was completely bald and had a number of implants melded into the skin of his upper neck. His sunken in grey eyes beheld years of experience on the battlefield, despite Silas' advancing age he was still a formidable opponent with his psychic powers.

McNeal was a man in his mid-thirties, his short blonde hair had been made into a military styled crew-cut and had the same violet eyes that almost all Cadians were born with. His face also had a number of battle scars as was befitting a veteran such as himself.

Several Imperial assassins had also been tasked with accompanying the Inquisitor for the foreseeable future. A Vindicare known only as Sev, a Callidus assassin by the name of Lilith. And an Eversor assassin code named EA-2359, who was only used as a last resort given the Eversor assassin's penchant for ferocious psychotic rages and was always deployed behind enemy lines away from any friendly forces.

The last and youngest member of the retinue was Dante, a seventeen year old boy that had seen more frightening things than many could even fathom in his short life. Dante was Inquisitor Elias' apprentice and the closest thing that he had to a son. Dante was recruited after a Chaos space marine warband appeared on his home world almost seven years ago. During the attack all of Dante's friends and loved ones were butchered or sacrificed to the Ruinous Powers five years ago. All that was left of Dante was anger, hatred and a desire for nothing short of revenge.

During the sheer madness that had been wrought upon his home world Dante had shown remarkable mental fortitude for a boy of his age. After Dante had managed to make it back to the Imperial lines he was tested for any signs of chaotic taint, as it was rare that someone came back from a Chaos Space Marine encampment without a seed of heresy being planted. When it became clear that the young Dante was not a pawn of the Dark Gods, an Inquisitor by the name of Elias quickly took an interest in the young lad due to the fact that despite having seen countless horrors, his mental state was still intact.

It was unfounded for a boy no older than ten or eleven years old to have suffered at the hands of Chaos to not only emerge alive but also remain completely untainted by the Ruinous Powers. Several had speculated that this was one of the reasons that Elias wanted to take the boy under his wing. After all, anyone with the ability to be able to withstand the tormenting gaze of the Warp without going completely mad or succumbing to their two-faced promises, could prove to be a very valuable asset to the Inquisition.

The battle for control of the planet continued to wage on for almost three months with no end in sight. With casualties amongst the PDF and the Inquisition's warriors, Inquisitor Elias made a request for reinforcements. Within a few weeks' time, two full regiments of Cadian Guard and three Death Korps of Krieg siege regiments arrived on Patronus. Shortly after the arrival of the Imperial guard regiments the tide began to turn in the Imperium's favor and slowly the forces of Chaos found themselves being pushed back, little by little.

The Inquisitors soon found themselves taking command of large groups of Imperial Guardsmen as they scoured the planet for the root of the heresy on Patronus. After capturing and 'interrogating' a number of Chaos cultists and traitor PDF troopers they eventually learned their end game. The construction of a portal that lead directly into the Warp, Emperor knew what kind of horrors would be unleashed upon the Imperium from that unholy construct.

Time was of the essence as reconnaissance units that had been sent out stated that it looked like the gateway was nearly completed. The portal itself was located in the center of the capital city that had been seized by the cultists and their allies early on in the fighting. Now the city itself was completely surrounded on all sides by five Imperial Guard regiments, several untainted PDF platoons, and several squads of Adeptus Arbites volunteers who had extensive knowledge of the city. Last but not least were the Inquisitors and the warriors that they had brought with them.

Currently one member of Elias' retinue, Dante, was sitting down behind a small table in of the rooms that were inside one of the bunkers that lined the trenches that the Death Korps finished constructing shortly after they had arrived. He was cleaning his weapons as he didn't want them to malfunction in the heat of battle.

Dante had already gone over his chainsword and a specially modified shock maul called a psy-maul. Psy-mauls were a very recent weapon that had been put into production for the Inquisition. Like the power maul it emitted a powerful shock when it struck someone but it had a second function; when activated it emitted anti-psyker energies that heavily dampened the abilities of a psyker for a very short period of time.

At the moment he was trying to finish cleaning his bolt pistol which had been a 'gift' of sorts by his mentor; Inquisitor Elias after he had shown a penchant with one handed weapons. The pistol itself was quite unique, it had a scope that was able to help take down targets at a much longer range and it even carried a silencing mechanism which had proven to be thus far, invaluable during infiltration missions.

His armor was the same kind of carapace armor that most Inquisitorial storm troopers used but his was noticeably different. For one it wasn't as bulky as the armor that most storm troopers wore and Dante commonly wore a great coat that covered most of the armor, and the helmet was much more, unique.

The helmet itself was skull shaped, in fact it looked like a mixture between an Eversor assassin's helmet and that of a Space Marine Chaplain's. It was capable of doing several of the same functions that the Imperial storm troopers helms were capable of such as a built in auspex and vox unit. It also served as a very effective form of protection against most firearms such as las guns, stubbers and similar weapons.

Like several members of the Ordo Malleus, Dante almost always kept his face obscured from view if it was possible. With this in mind, Dante almost constantly wore his 'skull helm' when he was out in the field and only took it off when he was sure that he was in an area where he was positive that there weren't any prying eyes. There were a great many who would probably call this paranoia but given the duties that Inquisitors had to perform on a daily basis, trust in anyone, even oneself was a luxury that they could ill afford.

Dante had all but finished cleaning his weapons when he heard a knock at the door leading into the room. The apprentice stood up from his work and placed his weapons back in their scabbards before he turned around and faced the door "Enter," he said seconds before a Death Korpsman from the 503rd siege regiment walked in. The Death Korpsman wore the standard attire for all soldiers that came from Krieg, a standard flak armor chest plate, a great coat, thick, baggy looking pants, dirtied combat boots and of course their trademark helmet and gasmask.

"Soldier, identification number," Dante stated, deciding it best to get straight to the point even though the way he spoke could be misinterpreted as rude. However it was doubtful that the Death Korpsman would really mind all that much considering how their emotions had been ruthlessly purged from their minds after they were conscripted into the Krieg's military as children.

The Death Korps guardsman stood at attention and spoke in an almost detached voice "Private 769355-637566-Keled sir, I've been ordered to escort you to the command bunker by Inquisitor Elias, he needs you there for the briefing immediately." Dante then gestured for Keled to take him to the command bunker. The Death Korpsman gave a slight nod before he turned around and walked out back into the trenches with Dante following close behind him.

Outside the bunker was a trench that was wide enough for a Leman Russ battle tank to fit in, outside the trench towards the city was a thick maze of razor wire, tank traps and land mines. In the back of the lines, the artillery pieces constantly fired their heavy ordinance into the city destroying the desecrated husks that were once glorious buildings stood proudly. In the lines themselves, were hundreds of Imperial Guardsmen going about their jobs that ranged from patrolling the frontline trenches and the men in the towers keeping watch for any movement beyond the lines.

As they made their way through the grime and the mud of the trenches the guardsmen that saw Dante showed him the same decorum of respect that they would show Lord Inquisitor Elias. Most gave quick salutes if their hands were free but if they were carrying something then they would simply give a nod of respect. Most of the Imperial Guardsmen that they came across, seemed to be a little unnerved by Dante's presence. It was to be expected, as Dante was a member of Elias' retinue and he was an Inquisitor in training so it was only natural they would be uneasy around him.

Out of all the forces of the Imperium the Inquisition was by far the most feared out of all of them. Inquisitors had near unlimited authority to do whatever they deemed to be necessary. They could requisition almost anything they needed to complete their missions, they suspected almost everyone of heresy and if there was even a hint that someone knew something relevant, they would be brought in for interrogation.

These interrogations rarely ended well for the individual that was brought in for questioning. There were also times albeit very rarely, where they would simply execute someone because they knew or were related to the heretic just to be on the safe side.

However that paled in comparison to what the Inquisition was most notorious for enacting, an Exterminatus. An Exterminatus was enacted only in the event a planet was about to fall to the enemy. But it could also be enacted if whatever was on the planet was too dangerous to be contained by conventional means and ran a very real risk of spreading to other imperial worlds.

When an Exterminatus was undertaken, a fleet would take up positions around the planet and commence a sustained, full-scale planetary bombardment which would inevitably cause the planet's biosphere to collapse, killing every living thing on the planet. Thankfully for the people of the Imperium this was only done as a last resort where no other practical options were available. Besides given how well the campaign was progressing on Patronus it was highly doubtful that such an act would even need to be performed on this world.

At last Dante and his guide arrived at the bunker that was being used by the high ranking officers for a planning room. Keled opened the door that lead into the bunker and allowed Dante to enter the bunker. Upon walking inside the teenager saw Elias along with five other high ranking Imperial Guard officers going over a map of the city, along with a group of commissars who were watching them silently.

At least three of the ranking officers were part of the Death Korps while the other two were clearly men of Cadia given their uniform insignias and violet eye color. He also noticed that the rest of Elias retinue were not in admittance, which was to be expected.

Normally they almost always be together when on a mission, during a large conflict such as this, Elias would have the members of his retinue go to where they were needed the most in the meantime. They would either be assassinating enemy officers, reconnaissance, sabotage, or leading raids against outlying enemy positions in preparation for the main attack, amongst other things one would do to make an assault easier. The retinue would more than likely make it back to the Lord Inquisitor's side before the battle began.

They seemed to be going over some last minute details for the assault on the city as some of the Guardsmen were arguing with one another on what would be the best possible way to retake the capital of Patronus. The moment that Elias spotted Dante he gestured for the officers to be silent and for his apprentice to approach. Dante did as he was silently ordered and walked over to his superior and gave a quick, yet respectful bow.

Elias did not return the gesture from his subordinate/student and instead gestured for him to look at the map of the city as he spoke "Good of you to join us Dante, now have a look at the map." Dante did as he was bid and looked at the screen. The screen showed the city that had a large number of red symbols inside while on the outside was an even larger amount of green colored symbols.

Once Elias saw that Dante had committed the positions into memory he spoke up while he gestured to the Imperial positions around the city, "In twenty four hours we will be launching a full scale assault on the city." A large number of the green symbols on the map then became highlighted and they started to advance on the enemy positions that were just outside of the city.

Underneath each of the green symbols was a unit name and Dante easily noticed that all of them were part of the regiments from Krieg, most of them infantry in Gorgons and several Leman Russ battle tanks acting as escorts. It made sense, after all the Death Korps were quite possibly the most zealous military force out of all the Imperium's armies, aside several chapters of the Adeptus Astartes of course.

In fact there were many who questioned the need to have commissars attached to their regiments. The answer was actually quite simple and also very ironic, the Commissars were there not because the Death Korps needed fear and discipline to keep them in line. Instead it was because they needed someone to keep them from becoming too, overeager in performing their duties. Every Death Korpsman had an almost suicidal drive in them to fight the enemies of mankind with everything they had. They cared not for their own lives or their comrades, only that they won the battle.

The symbols for the armored and aerial units then lit up and started to advance along with the Krieg regiments. "The first wave will consist entirely of the Krieg regiments, they will be followed by a second wave of armor, primarily Chimeras, Hellhounds, Leman Russ tanks and Baneblades from the Cadian regiments.

As the first and second wave advance, they will have air support from several Vulture and Valkyrie squadrons as well as several Stormravens, the latter of which will aid our ground forces after they have finished deploying groups of our 'specialists' in key enemy positions inside the city. Reconnaissance forces that were sent out several days ago were able to sabotage most of the anti-air weapons that were of any real threat to our air forces, therefore we will utilize this newfound advantage in every way possible."

As the other forces continued to advance on the board, Dante made a note that there were a number of forces that were being held back, mainly the ones that belonged to Inquisitor Rogan and a few platoons of Imperial Guardsmen. It was easy to surmise that they were being kept in reserve even before Dante's mentor stated that they were being held in reserve in the event that the first assault didn't go as planned.

Elias then turned to his protégé who was standing just a few feet away from him, "Dante I will need you to pilot one of the Stormraven's into the city. The rest of my retinue and I will be on the ground aiding the Imperial Guardsmen in taking the outer sections of the city," he then turned his attention back to the map of the city, more specifically a cathedral that was close to the center of it.

"Once we have entered the city the Inquisitorial forces will make their way to this area at best speed. From what we have been able to ascertain from the prisoners we interrogated as well as our own recon reports, the cultists are planning to open a gateway into the Warp. We can only assume that they mean to bring in a massive army to aid in their attempts to take over this planet. The assault will begin in three hours. You all have your orders, I suggest that you carry them out."

The other generals gave a rare "Yes sir," as they were used to people saying that to them and filed out of the command bunker without a word.

Once the last of the commanding officers of the Imperial Guard were finally finished leaving Dante turned to look at his mentor "Lord Elias, I know I risk much by asking what may very well be an impertinent question, but I must ask: why am I piloting a Stormraven above the battle and not at your side on the ground?"

If Elias was offended at all by the question he did not show it "Because you are one of the few people that I know I am able to trust, besides you're piloting skills make you an valuable asset in aerial support missions, therefore I need you in the air for this battle, not on the ground." In response Dante merely nodded. Elias then dismissed him, telling that it would be best for him to get ready for the coming battle.

Just under three hours later Dante was in the cockpit of the Stormraven he had been assigned to use. This particular Stormraven had two twin linked multi-meltas mounted right below the cockpit, hurricane bolters attached to its side sponsons and a lascannon turret perched atop the roof of the aircraft.

In the back of the Stormraven was a full squad of Grey Knight terminators, each one carrying either a nemesis force weapon and storm bolter, an incinerator or even a psycannon. They all waited patiently for the Stormraven to lift up off the ground and into the air, not a word was passed between any of them as they sat in complete and utter silence. For most people it would be somewhat unnerving for several tall, quiet, heavily armed and armored individuals to be sitting right behind you, but Dante had grown used to the silent patience that this particular squad of Grey Knights displayed before they went out into combat.

Eventually the silence was broken when a voice came over the Stormraven's vox unit. It was one of the officers in the Inquisitorial storm troopers that Elias had under his command, "All forces, the assault is a go I repeat the assault is a go! Glory to the Imperium!"

Then, in near perfect sync with one another, the Imperial aircraft lifted up off the ground and began to fly towards the city. As the Stormraven flew up above the Imperial positions, Dante noticed the mass of Imperial Guard vehicles that were starting to make their way passed no man's land and towards the city itself.

Eventually Dante saw that the leading vehicle was in fact a Land Raider with the Inquisitorial seal on the top of the armor. It was just like Dante's mentor to lead the attack against the enemy. Some called Elias' willingness to be in the forefront of the assault reckless bravado, but Dante called it courage in the face of the enemies of Mankind.

A few minutes later, the large group of flyers entered the outer sections of the city but as they did, they were beset upon by auto cannons and similar weapons that had very limited anti-air capabilities. Of course given that most of the really effective anti-air weapons had already been disposed of, the defenders had great difficulty in hitting the Imperial aircraft. Sadly though, a few lucky hits to either the engine or the cockpit of the Valkyries sent them plummeting into the ground.

Through either luck or the Emperor's divine will, Dante's Stormraven managed to keep itself from getting hit by the heretics' weaponry and make it to the designated drop zone for the Grey Knight Terminators. The landing zone was a very large, rubble filled crater that provided a small amount of cover for the Terminators, not that they really needed any though given the armor that they wore could withstand anything short of anti-armor weaponry.

Unfortunately there were two full squads of chaos space marines as well as a group of cultists on the second and third floor of the ruined buildings that were dangerously close to the LZ. Dante couldn't see an anti-armor weapon on any of them, which meant that it was unlikely that they could do the Grey Knight terminators any real harm but Dante decided it would be best err on the side of caution.

The Inquisitor in training opened up with the Stormraven's heavy bolters and hurricane bolter sponsons. The bolter rounds sent bits and pieces of the building fell off as the rounds that didn't go into the bodies of the traitors, impacted the building that surrounded them causing dust and bits of concrete to fly everywhere.

After several long bursts of sustained bolter fire, Dante let go of the trigger on the joystick and waited a few moments for the dust to finally clear before he saw that the shredded bits and pieces of the heretics. Satisfied that they were dead, Dante continued to descend to the landing zone. As the Stormraven hovered downwards the Grey Knights remained silent.

They did not even bother to ask what had just happened as it was rather easy for anyone to surmise that the Storm Raven's pilot had encountered the servants of Chaos and that he had eliminated them. There had been a hostile force that could very well have posed a threat to the transport and now they were dead.

Finally the Stormraven set down in the crater and the boarding ramp in front of the aircraft lowered. Without missing a beat the squad of terminators ran out of the aircraft as quickly as their bulky armor would allow. Once the last of the Grey Knights had finished disembarking from the Stormraven; the boarding ramp was raised back into place and the aircraft once more took to the skies as he wasn't supposed to escort the Grey Knights to their objective which was just a scant few blocks down the street from where they had landed.

As Dante flew around the ruined city in the Stormraven he eliminated several enemy defensive positions, and as well as a number of vehicles with the lascannon turret, but there were still city filled with heretics and traitors to kill. Despite the hectic nature of the battle in the city, Dante was still able to easily keep in touch with Inquisitor Elias who – along with the rest of his retinue - was still making his way towards the unfinished Warp Gate in the center of the city.

Eventually Dante received a call for assistance from a group of Imperial Guardsmen who were pinned down by cultist sniper fire in the manufacturing district. Like its name suggested, the manufacturing district was primarily used to build machinery for the Imperium. Given that the planet wasn't a Forge World, the factories of Patronus' were only able to produce small vehicles and small arms for the local PDF.

Before the Chaos cult could take control of the factories several loyal PDF platoons made a daring but futile stand against the cultists. Eventually a single PDF platoon was forced to escape through the sewers but they had at the very least managed to deny the enemy their prize by setting up several explosive charges inside the factories, completely destroying them.

Members of the Adeptus Mechanicus all but demanded that the PDF troopers be executed for the destruction of the factories that they had created in the name of the Machine God. The commissars attached to the PDF were also more than willing to oblige their demands for the troopers' deaths as they had presumably fled from battle like cowards.

Fortunately for the retreating troopers however, Inquisitor Mena had stepped in and managed to smooth things over with the machine cult. She had interviewed each of the troopers shortly after their escape from the city and found that a lieutenant colonel had been with them throughout the battle and had given them a direct order to destroy the factories if they could not be held and to fall back to the Imperial lines.

Inquisitor Mena quickly came to the conclusion that the actions of the troopers were not heretical to the Emperor nor the Machine Cult and they had obeyed their commander's orders to the letter so they were not deserters nor were they cowards. However they had destroyed several valuable pieces of material production in the subsector, so the lieutenant colonel would simply have to make do serving as just a regular lieutenant for quite some time.

The instant that he snipers spotted the Stormraven they aimed their weapons directly at it and opened fire in a vain attempt to damage the machine, all the while they howled blasphemous words against the Imperium. Once again the might of the hurricane and heavy bolters purged the heathens of their lives and left the foul traitors as little more than pieces of sinew and gore.

Just after he had finished assisting the guardsman that the voice of Dante's mentor came over one of the secure vox channels "Dante I need you to provide us with air support at the following coordinates, the forces of the Imperium need to make the final push into the heart of the city at best speed! The heretics have already finished the construction of the Warp Gate, it's only a matter of time until they activate it!"

"At once Lord Inquisitor!" Dante immediately pushed the Stormraven as quickly as it could possibly go towards the center of the city. There was no time to waste, if the Chaos Space Marine Warband and their cultist allies managed to open a portal into the Warp, then anything from a massive army to a fleet of Chaos warships could slip through. The mere thought alone of the servants of the Ruinous Powers spreading their malicious influence further into the Imperium made Dante wish that the Stormraven could fly faster than it already was.

Before the Stormraven could get very far however there was a massive boom in the very center of the city followed by a shockwave that nearly sent the Stormraven crashing into the city streets.

Once Dante finally managed to get the Stormraven stable again he could clearly see a dark purple beam of light that was shining up into the sky. Everything was all too clear to Dante, the forces of Chaos had managed to open a portal into the Warp itself!

* * *

-Patronus' capital city: New Dawn, near the center of the city a few moments earlier-

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Inquisitor Elias and his retinue as well as a cadre of Grey Knights and Inquisitorial storm troopers were making their way towards the center of the city. All the while they were praying to the Emperor that they would be able to reach it before the foul minions of Chaos could open the Warp Gate. They fought through a host of vile traitor marines and insane cultists that continued to throw everything they had at them which continued to slow down their progress into the city.

Currently Elias and the rest of his retinue were taking cover in one of the ruined buildings. The only members of the retinue that was not with them was the Callidus assassin Lilith who was currently infiltrating the enemy ranks to eliminate key officers or to sabotage their heavy weapons and equipment. The other was EA-2359 who had been dropped several miles north of their position and was currently going after a PDF General that had betrayed much of the city to the forces of Chaos.

Elias looked over at Ryder who had been kind enough to provide a suppressing fire with his heavy stubber in conjunction with the storm troopers' hotshot lasguns, while the Grey Knights eliminated the cultists with pinpoint shots from their own ranged weaponry.

Most of the initially charging cultists and even a couple of the Chaos Space Marines were gunned down in this manner, but there were several that were eliminated through headshots courtesy of the Vindicare assassin on a nearby roof. After the first wave of charging heretics were gunned down many of them took cover behind whatever ruined debris that they could find in either the street or the partially destroyed buildings. But their shelter provided them little protection from a Sev's Exitus rifle.

Whenever Sev received an order from Inquisitor Elias he would carry it out without any hesitation but most of his orders were to stay close and provide covering fire from the best possible vantage point. There were many found it odd that an Assassin was providing supporting fire when he should have been doing as his namesake suggested and going off on one's own and targeting the leaders of whatever enemy they were fighting. Sev didn't really care what others thought of him. The only thing that held any true meaning to him was that he did his duty to the Imperium and at the moment that duty meant that he had to follow Inquisitor Elias' orders.

Whenever Sev did something like this, he generally targeted those that were high up in the chain of command as it would help disrupt the enemy's chain of command and make it easier for the enemy to be defeated. As Sev worked he was completely silent. The only sounds that could be heard from him was either the crack of his weapon going off or when given an order he would send a single click for "yes," or two for "no" into his vox.

Sev aimed set his oversized sniper rifle's sights a completely bald cultist who wore nothing but a commissar's coat above the waist. The man was completely covered in self-inflicted scars and tattoos in the shapes of the symbols of the ruinous powers. He held a chainsword in his right hand and an auto-pistol in his left, and was apparently gesturing for the other cultists in the group to charge the enemy with the chainsword.

The Vindicare assassin lined up his shot so that it would hit right between the heretic's eyes and squeezed the trigger. There was a loud boom and everything above the cultist commander's jaw vanished in an explosion of blood, brain matter and bone. This process repeated itself with several other cultists and Chaos Space Marines that tried to take cover from him. None of them managed to survive for more than a few moments when Sev targeted them with his Exitus rifle.

When the last of the cultists' officers had fallen, one of the Grey Knights – possibly a squad leader - cried "Praise the Emperor and strike down his foes! _Charge_!" With that the Grey Knights as well as Inquisitor Elias quickly advanced firing their ranged weapons as they went. The instant that they got close they readied their Nemesis force halberds, swords and hammers at the ready as they charged straight into the enemy makeshift defensive line, and subsequently tore them to pieces.

The cultists only lasted a few scant seconds before they were slaughtered as their weapons and makeshift armor were all but useless against the heavy armor of a space marine. The Chaos Space Marines however were able to keep themselves from being overwhelmed for a few moments, but they were too few as they had been specifically targeted due to the threat they posed and were quickly slain as well.

Once the hostiles in the immediate area were eliminated Silas Mahan and Inquisitor Elias a sudden burst of Warp energies being emitted near the center of the city. It could only mean that the cultists had finished the construction on the foul Warp Gate and were preparing to open it and allow their traitorous brethren through. The feeling of such a foul construct begin to activate made them want to vomit in disgust.

There was no time to dawdle, they needed to get to the Warp Gate immediately and destroy it before the forces of Chaos brought through reinforcements. Without hesitating Inquisitor Elias contacted the Stormraven that his protégé was piloting "Dante I need you to provide us with air support at the following coordinates, the forces of the Imperium need to make the final push into the heart of the city at best speed! The heretics have already finished the construction of the Warp Gate, it's only a matter of time until they activate it!"

Dante gave an "At once Lord Inquisitor!" Unfortunately there would be no air support as Elias felt the Warp energies continue to become stronger at an alarming rate. Within moments Elias heard a deafening noise akin to that of an artillery shell exploding coming from the direction of the where the Warp Gate was located. Then there was a shockwave and anyone that wasn't in power armor was flown off of their feet and onto their backs. Not one to be down for very long, Elias got up off of the ruined streets and looked to where the shockwave had come from and saw a beam of purple light that was no doubt pure Warp energy shooting upwards to the clouds.

"Blast and damnation, the heretics have already activated it!" Elias viciously swore before Captain McNeal of the storm troopers walked over to him "My lord, is there any way we can stop it?!" he demanded. Elias let out a bated breath and took a closer look at the light and soon gave a sigh of relief.

"It seems that the Emperor is truly with us today, the Warp Gate doesn't' seem to have reached full power yet, I surmise that the blasphemers allowed the Warp Gate to activate before it was truly ready to be activated. Right now I would hazard a guess that it doesn't have the power to support anything in or out of it. If something large enough was to either exit it or enter it at this point it would more than likely collapse and rendered useless to the heretics." It was at this point that everyone heard Dante over the vox network.

"Inquisitor Elias how big would this object have to be?" he asked. Almost without thinking Elias said "At least the size of a land speeder but…" he then trailed off realizing what Dante was now planning on doing "No, no I will not allow it Dante you are too valuable to the Inquisition to perform such a foolish course of action! That much warp exposure would consume you entirely!"

There was a brief pause on the other end of the Vox Network "It has truly been an honor to serve the Inquisition my lord, the Emperor protects." As if to validate this statement, a Stormraven bearing the seal of the Inquisition flew directly overhead. Elias continued to yell into his vox unit in an attempt to try and dissuade his apprentice from this action but it was all for naught as the ship continued on and Dante ignored the angry and desperate yells that were coming through his vox.

* * *

Despite the seeming eagerness that Dante had displayed to sacrifice himself in the name of the Imperium it was anything but an easy decision for him. True he was more than prepared to give his life for the sake of all Humanity like any decent Inquisitor would but he had hoped that he would have become a full-fledged Inquisitor by then. But it seemed as though the Emperor had different plans for him this day.

As the ship continued towards the Warp Gate the servants of Chaos opened fire with whatever weapons they had on hand; bolters, stubbers, lasguns, autoguns, whatever was on hand. Most of the fire was deflected off of the Stormraven's heavy armor but a lucky lasgun round managed to punch through the glass canopy and struck Dante in the shoulder. His carapace armor managed to deflect most of the shot but Dante could feel a slight burning sensation on his shoulder. The Inquisitor in training ignored the wound and continued on. Several more las and autogun shots managed to make their way into the cockpit, but his carapace armor held, barely.

Soon the Warp Gate was in sight, its foul energies were pouring into reality. The cathedral that had once stood there was broken down and destroyed to make room for the abomination that was now erected there. The gate itself was an enormous eight pointed star that was horizontally laid out like an unholy landmark. No doubt the foul traitors had placed it there just so that they would be able to defile the glorious temple to the Emperor that once stood there. As Dante neared the gate the enemy gunfire intensified and he began to hear the whispers of the creatures of the Warp but he ignored them.

Within moments the Stormraven entered the Warp Gate and the occupant knew that he would likely, never be seen again. After the Imperial aircraft was inside the warp the gateway that the cultists and traitor forces had worked so hard to build deactivated. The strange purple light in the sky dissipated and cracks appeared on the Warp Gate before it fell to pieces.

* * *

-The Warp-

* * *

The instant that Dante had entered the Warp he closed his eyes, not wanting to gaze into the abyss and invite one of its foul denizens into his mind. Daemons whispered all around him as they scratched and tore at the Stormraven's canopy. They promised him the power to remake the universe in his own image, to lead the forces of Mankind in glorious conquest across the stars amongst other things that would tempt many a man.

However Dante remained strong, he did not respond nor even consider any of the two-faced offers that they tried to tempt him with. After a few moments of silently enduring the whispering of the Warp, Dante began to pray to the Emperor to give him the strength to resist this daemonic scourge that tried to lead him into betraying mankind.

The young Inquisitor in training began to pray to the Emperor for strength against these daemons, and almost immediately the whispers became cries of rage and frustration that slowly started to get farther and farther away. There was also a sensation as if the Stormraven itself was being pulled forwards by something and as it did Dante felt the howling of the creatures of the Warp dissipate completely, not even the whispers remained.

Taking a chance Dante opened his eyes and saw a bright light starting to envelop both him and the Stormraven he was inside. It must have been the Emperor. Who else but the Father of Mankind could have driven away so many daemons with such ease and strength? He must have heard Dante's prayers and come to save him!

Dante couldn't have been farther from the truth.

Eventually the light faded and much to his disappointment and confusion Dante saw that he was not at the Emperor's side in paradise like he had hoped. Instead he was still flying a now badly damaged Stormraven above a rocky desert that was close to a very wide and deep ravine. The Stormraven was steadily losing altitude at an alarming rate. Instantly several years' worth of training kicked and Dante attempted to adjust the transport's altitude but it wasn't working. The controls for the thrusters weren't responding but at least he could still try and keep his ship from going into a nosedive.

The Stormraven soon plunged into the sand and rock filled ravine despite the pilot's wish against that happening. Dante barely managed to keep the Stormraven level as it fell into the ravine. Within moments the ship crashed and the momentum at which it had been going caused it to drag itself along the ground for several meters before it finally came grinding to a halt.

To be continued.


	2. Hostile Contact

The Inquisitor

Chapter 2

Hostile Contact

A/N: if anyone knows the names of the medicines that are used in Warhammer 40k please let me know because I've been unable to find any information regarding them.

* * *

-Unknown planet, ravine in desert-

* * *

It took only a few minutes for Dante to get out of the ruined cockpit of the Stormraven. The instant that he was out of the assault transport Dante felt the adrenaline of the battle from earlier begin to wear off and the pain from his wounds started to manifest. Dante bit back a scream and instead gritted his teeth and let out a pained hiss, he was a loyal servant of the Emperor of Mankind not some whining little child.

He would have to endure the pain until he could grab some meds for the pain. He had endured far worse injuries than a few simple las and autogun wounds. Besides if enduring this pain was the price to keep his soul from the maw of the Warp then Dante would gladly pay it a thousand times over. Internally Dante was singing countless praises to the Emperor for rescuing him from the clutches of Chaos and the Warp.

Once Dante was finally finished with his prayers to the almighty Emperor, he pushed a button on the side of his helmet and spoke into its internal vox unit. "This is Dante of the Ordo Malleus are there any Imperial forces receiving this transmission?" he asked but there was only static. Dante continued to try and contact someone on his helmet's vox caster for a few moments more before he finally gave up and opted to instead get out of the cockpit.

The glass canopy was still shut and the mechanical systems to open it were completely shot, it took a few moments for Dante to manually pry it open to the point that he could finally get out of the cockpit. As he got out of the Stormraven he took a quick glance at the turret where the gun servitor had been giving him covering fire and saw that it had not been as fortunate as Dante was. The glass window into it was completely torn apart and the servitor was gone, and in its place was nothing but blood and synthetic oil that kept the entity running.

Carefully Dante made his way towards the forward access ramp and started to feel somewhat disoriented in addition to the pain he was feeling. Dante didn't know what was causing it. He hadn't banged his head at all during the crash and even if he did, the protective covering of his undamaged helmet would have softened the blows and kept him from getting any severe damage to his brain.

Of course it could have been from the pain he was feeling but that had never really caused him to be disoriented unless it was life threatening and his wounds certainly weren't life threatening. Perhaps it was some sort of an aftereffect of going through the warp without the protection of a Gellar Field?

If that was indeed the case then Dante should consider himself having truly been given divine protection from the Emperor, seeing as how nothing else had happened to him during his trip through the Warp. Dante had heard tales of unfortunate individuals who had tried to brave the miasma of the Warp without the protection of Gellar Fields or the guiding light of the Astronomicon. Many of them went mad and soon died but most times other much darker, fouler outcomes occurred.

Whatever the reason for this disorientation, Dante had no real time for it. The Inquisitor in training leaned up against the hull of the ruined Stormraven to prevent himself from falling to the ground as a result of his mild disorientation and kept moving, even as he tried to shake off the spinning around him. As Dante neared his destination he started to feel the dizziness begin to fade away. Whatever the cause of it was, he was thankful at least it wasn't lasting for very long.

When Dante finally made it to the rear access ramp he saw that the rear access ramp's locking mechanisms had been broken in the crash and the ramp itself was partially opened already. _'Good,'_ thought Dante _'This will make opening it much easier.'_ Originally Dante had believed that he would need to use his chainsword to slowly carve an entrance through the ramp in order for him to get inside but it seemed as though that that course of action would not be necessary.

He grabbed the partially raised ramp and pulled down with all his strength. Pain started to build in the wounded areas of his body as it protested against what Dante was doing but once again he ignored it as best he could. At first, it didn't seem like the ramp was moving at all but soon the boarding ramp slowly started to descend downwards after what felt like an eternity. In just a few short moments it had lowered itself to the point where Dante could easily get into the Stormraven's passenger compartment and see if there was anything that would prove to be useful left inside.

Just as Dante had anticipated, there were a number of supply crates that were scattered about the floor. Most of them had probably fallen out of the overhead compartments but it was of very little matter, Dante didn't need the crates to be in the compartments he just needed their contents to be intact and in working condition. Dante eyed the nearest one and walked over to it and saw the symbol that was normally used for medical supplies painted onto it. This was just what he needed.

Dante opened it up and found more than enough medical equipment to tend to his wounds but right now he had to make the crash site and the surrounding area more defensible. A quick search of the crates revealed a number of weapons that included several lasguns with a fair number of charge packs for each one, a plasma gun and pistol, a grenade launcher, and numerous full magazines for bolters and bolt pistols.

There were even a couple of sets of carapace armor inside one of the crates. Dante would make great use of those should the need arise. Most importantly however there were a number of crates that contained military rations and canteens that were filled to the brim with water. Those would probably hold him for a few weeks at most if Dante was able to ration them properly.

If Dante was very lucky maybe he'd be able to get into contact with a nearby Imperial outpost and get the hell off this planet and back to the Inquisition. No doubt they would want to ask him more than a few questions on how he survived his experience in the Warp and hopefully they wouldn't simply execute him on the grounds that he might be an agent of Chaos.

No that was unlikely that would happen, Inquisitor Elias was a high ranking member of the Ordos Malleus and had invested too much time and effort into training him so it was unlikely that he would be immediately executed. More than likely they would have Silas enter his mind and scan some of his memories to ensure that his loyalties remained securely with Imperium and the Emperor.

Dante was broken out of his thoughts when the pain from his wounds flared up once again. The young Inquisitor in training let out a pained hiss and gritted his teeth in pain. Dante went back over to the medical supplies and pulled out a syringe and a vial containing one of the Imperium's medicines. This one in particular was known to help speed the healing and acted as a painkiller without making one too groggy. After injecting the contents of the syringe into his body, Dante felt the pain that had been afflicting him quickly vanish.

With that out of the way Dante grabbed two crates, one containing the lasguns while the other had the plasma pistol and rifle and walked out of the craft. He knew that the Stormraven's crash site was in a terrible place to stay for too long. True the first place a rescue party would look would be inside the vessel but Dante also knew that it would also be the first place that any groups hostile to the Imperium would also look.

There were many who would consider this kind of thinking bordering on paranoid but considering what the Inquisition had to deal with on a daily basis, the less trusting one was, the longer they would end up living. Besides it was always prudent to have a fallback position when in unknown territory. Once Dante was outside he took a look at some of his surroundings. There wasn't much that would offer good cover and concealment if a battle started, but there had to be something out there that would offer at least _some_ protection from both the heat and the possibility of an attack.

Eventually his eyes settled on what looked like the entrance to a cave nearby and started to walk over towards it. There were several large rocks a few meters in front of it which would provide more than adequate cover should a firefight occur. The entrance was relatively small so if he needed to fall back into the cave it would force any hostiles to enter roughly one or two at a time. Dante grabbed the container that held the las guns and ammunition as well as the one that carried the plasma weapons.

The walk itself felt longer than it really was due to the weight of the two crates he was dragging behind him and the rays of the sun that were beating down upon him didn't help. However Dante had done many physically strenuous activities (fighting in uncountable battles against the foes of the Imperium, slaying daemons etc.) for the past several years, so he was more than fit enough to drag a couple of weapon crates a short distance from the crash site.

It took roughly thirty to forty seconds of walking in the bright hot sun but Dante inevitably reached the entrance to the cave and went inside. The inside of the cave was actually a lot more spacious than he had originally thought and was surprisingly cooler than it was out in desert heat. It would be a perfect shelter for him while he either awaited rescue or scouted the surrounding area for any sign of Imperial presence.

Dante set down the two munitions crates down a few meters inside of the cave and reopened the one containing the plasma weapons and reexamined them closely to make sure that the cooling vents hadn't been damaged in any way during the crash. Thankfully there wasn't so much as a scratch on either one so he wouldn't have to worry about the weapon melting in his hands due to the venting mechanism having been broken.

The reason that the weapon itself wasn't very reliable with the forces of the Imperium was mainly due to how continued use of the weapon severely taxed the weapon's venting system. After each power cell was expended the weapon needed a short period of time to vent the excess heat that was built up. However in the heat of battle it was easy for one to forget to give the weapon a short break to cool off. This resulted in the weapon overheating and causing it to leak hydrogen plasma onto the user resulting in either injuring or even killing the weapon's handler.

However Dante didn't really care much about the risks when it came to doing his duty to the Imperium and grabbed the plasma pistol out of the container and loaded a hydrogen power cell into the weapon. The weapon started to hum as the power source for the weapon was inserted. The weapon would come in handy if anyone or anything made the foolish mistake of attacking him. Dante placed the weapon in his secondary pistol holster and started to walk back to the Stormraven to get more of the crates into the cave.

A few minutes later he was grabbing the crate that contained the grenade launcher and was about to leave the crashed vessel when he heard a loud noise fill the air. It was clearly mechanical and it made the same kind of noise a bladed weapon made when it was swung at a high rate of speed, but only at a much faster rate of speed.

Dante cautiously approached the rear access ramp of the Stormraven and pulled out his plasma pistol and hoped that the sound being emanated was from a vehicle belonging to forces that were loyal to the Imperium. But if they weren't, well, their life expectancy would soon get much shorter. Dante forced the rear access hatch open and his helmet's optical sensors were momentarily blinded by the amount of sand and similar debris that were being thrown around outside by what Dante assumed to be either a dust storm or –more likely- a landspeeder type of vehicle.

Soon the optical scanners managed to adjust to the debris that was flying everywhere and eventually Dante was able to make out what appeared to be a strange hovercraft of some kind. It didn't look like a landspeeder at all, instead it vaguely resembled an Ork warkopta however other than a pair of rotor blades they looked nothing alike. The most obvious was the fact that it wasn't constructed out of ramshackle parts, like most Ork vehicles and weapons. Instead it was constructed in a similar way to that of an Imperial Guard Valkyrie.

However this strange looking transport wasn't on Dante's priority list at the moment. Instead he was more focused on the ten armed individuals that were getting out of the transport. They were all clad in black armor that appeared to be made out of leather and all of them carried small rifles that closely resembled autoguns. Although one or two of them did carry shotguns and smaller autoguns that were almost the size of pistols.

They certainly didn't look Imperial, but Dante couldn't be sure and he would need to confirm who they were before he decided to just go and fire on them. Dante grabbed the grenade launcher from its resting place and loaded it with high explosive rounds before walking out of the ruined Stormraven at a relatively quick pace. He quickly moved behind the side of the ship and flipped the weapon's safety off, just in case these soldiers weren't part of the Imperium.

Once he was finished loading the weapon he called out to the armed men "In the name of the Emperor identify yourselves at once!" he yelled in his most authoritative voice he was capable of. The response the armed men gave was quick and made their intentions very clear; they dove behind the nearest cover that they could find and opened fire on Dante's position.

Dante reacted immediately and fired off three rounds from his grenade launcher at the aerial transport that was starting to take off just a few meters behind the enemy hoping to severely damage the vehicle. He certainly hadn't been expecting the vehicle to go up in a fiery explosion. The materials used in the construction of that transport must have been a great deal more frail than he originally had thought (yes I know this may sound unrealistic but keep in mind that Dante does have weapons and tech from the forty first millennium, besides this is the DC universe).

Around five of the ten hostiles were close to the vehicle when it exploded and plummeted back down to the ground and had been killed as a result. Most of the enemy soldiers had stopped firing and had gone to check on their allies or head into new cover while several of them used loud profanities to curse their young attacker in pure rage. It was a foolish move for them to take their eyes off their enemy and now they were going to pay for it with their lives.

Dante was about to open up with the grenade launcher but the trigger refused to budge even a millimeter. The weapon was jammed! The young inquisitor in training mentally cursed his rotten luck and proceeded to toss the now useless weapon on to the ground and reached for a weapon that was more than ready to fire.

Acting purely on instinct Dante pulled out his bolt pistol and fired several rounds into the loose dirt that was directly in front of the hostiles. The bolt pistol rounds exploded when they impacted the dirt as they were designed to do so upon hitting a target. This sent countless particles of loose dirt, sand and rock upwards, creating a makeshift smokescreen. It wouldn't last for very long however so Dante needed to work fast. He holstered his bolt pistol and drew his newly acquired plasma weapon and his chainsword before he charged the enemy's position.

The soldiers were firing in random directions in the smoke which made it harder to predict where they were going to hit next. Thankfully though Dante managed to evade their fire and get passed the smoke screen with relative ease. From there he struck without any sort of mercy or sympathy towards his attackers.

The first soldier to go down was dispatched with a plasma bolt to his now absent face. The next took two shots to the chest, completely disintegrating the ribcage and some of the organs behind it, turning them into jelly which poured out of the gaping wound and onto the ground as the soldier fell on his side.

Dante managed to eliminate a third soldier with his chainsword as his foe had been standing close to his fallen comrade. The blow was a diagonal slash down from the left shoulder to the left side of the waist. Blood and gore sprayed all over the immediate area as the vicious weapon cut through the man's torso and was screaming in agony as his life was swiftly taken from him.

Within just a few seconds the man was viciously ripped in half from the spinning blades of the chainsword. Dante then turned his attention to the remaining two soldiers both of whom were yelling various obscenities and curses towards Dante as they proceeded to open fire on him with their autoguns.

The greatcoat and carapace armor that Dante wore stopped most of the rounds but unfortunately for him there were several rounds that managed to get through the damaged parts of the armor. The impact from the autogun rounds sent the Inquisitor in training backwards into the ground with several new wounds on various parts of his body. Dante put a hand to an area where the armor had been damaged in the battle prior to the crash.

He soon found that a lot of blood was starting to pool in one of the new wounds that had just been inflicted on him. Thankfully the painkillers he had taken earlier were still in effect so at least Dante didn't have to deal with the nuisance of dealing with an illusion of the senses while he was in combat. Dante could tell that even though the pain killers were mitigating the pain, his vision was starting to blur and spin slightly and he knew that his wounds were more than likely going to be the end of him.

Dante let go of his chainsword and slowly reached for his holstered bolt pistol even as the two remaining soldiers started to advance on his position. As they advanced Dante moved with a speed he didn't know he possessed and drew his bolt pistol with his right hand and in a quarter of a second aimed it at one of the two soldiers and he pointed his plasma pistol at the other and fired.

Through either chance or fate, the rounds from both weapons found their marks despite the lightheadedness that Dante felt. The two remaining soldiers fell to the ground dead with gaping, horrific wounds and screamed in agony as they fell to the ground. When the last enemy soldier had fallen, Dante propped himself up against a nearby rock and started to breath heavily even as he tried to control the bleeding by putting his gloved hand over some of the more serious injuries.

Dante had seen similar injuries on other soldiers across hundreds of battlefields uncountable times before. He wasn't going to fool himself, Dante knew that he was probably going to die soon, given the amount of blood that was spilling its way out of his body and painting the sand a dark red. As Dante sat there he heard what sounded like the engines of a large aircraft. Could the enemy have called for reinforcements while he was fighting them?

He had managed to hear the words "backup" in between the gunfire but couldn't make much else out other than what were obviously curses directed at him as well as a few barked orders.

The transport eventually came into view and it was most definitely _not_ an Imperial craft. In fact it was remarkably similar to that of an Eldar vessel given its sleek appearance. However it wasn't any Eldar vessel that he had ever seen before. True it was sleek like most Eldar vehicles and aircraft, but it didn't have the same kind of wings that most of their craft had instead they were short and somewhat stubby and it didn't seem to be armed with any weaponry at all.

The vessel landed rather close to his position and within a few moments a ramp lowered from the craft. Dante started to raise his plasma pistol with a weak, shaking hand as several individuals started to descend down the ramp. He heard voices but he couldn't make out a word they spoke and darkness was beginning to creep up on the edges of his vision as it continued to blur. The voices of the people that were moving towards him could be heard but Dante could only make out a couple of words that they were saying to him.

Although it was clear that Dante would more than likely end up dead from his injuries, he also knew that there was a possibility however remote, that he would live and that these individuals would try to capture him and interrogate him despite his current condition. Of course it was unlikely that he would live long enough for that to happen but it would probably be better to be on the safe side and make sure that they didn't get their hands on him.

The young Inquisitor in training then proceeded to position the barrel of the plasma pistol away from these newcomers and aimed it directly at the side of his head. Right before he could pull the trigger something impacted the weapon and knocked the plasma pistol right out of his hands.

Dante managed to grab the bolt pistol that was laying nearby and attempted to raise the weapon up to his helmeted head but his strength had all but faded and he felt darkness envelope him. The instant before he lost consciousness, Dante prayed to the Emperor that he would be allowed to simply pass on in peace and not be taken by these figures.

* * *

-Justice League Javelin transport ship, a few minutes earlier-

* * *

It wasn't often that members of the Justice League had to bring out their Javelins for traveling around the United States as they had largely been replaced by the Zeta-Tubes as they were a much faster and reliable means of transit between areas. Of course there were several areas that didn't have any Zeta-Tube entry points. A ravine in a rather remote area of the Nevada Desert was one such location.

Almost a half-hour ago sensors aboard the Justice League's Watchtower detected a small yet insanely powerful spike of energy occurring in the Nevada Desert. In a manner similar to lightning, the energy spike dissipated almost as soon as it began but it lasted long enough for the Watchtower's sensors to get a fix on the position where it had occurred.

It also wasn't just the sensors that detected this anomaly, Zatara, Martian Manhunter and several of the other magic and psychic users of the League had literally _felt_ this happening. This meant that not only was this anomaly powerful but could also be either psychic or magical in nature or even both.

To investigate this clearly incredible and possibly dangerous occurrence the league sent several of their best members: Batman, Wonder Woman, Zatara, Superman, and two of Earth's Green Lanterns, Hal Jordan and John Stewart. They also had a second group of heroes that consisted of Captain Atom, Red Tornado, Aquaman, Captain Marvel, Green Arrow and Black Canary, standing by in the event that reinforcements were needed.

The only one who seemed to have a problem with this particular plan was Captain Marvel who wanted to be on the first team to go in. Even after Batman had explained to him that another team was needed in the event that the first group going in ran into trouble, Captain Marvel still seemed almost childishly bitter that he'd have to stay behind at the watchtower.

As the Javelin approached the site of the energy spike Batman saw on one of the computer monitors that had managed to zoom in on the site he saw something what could only be described as a warzone. There were two wrecks, one of a helicopter and another of some strange craft that Batman had never seen before in his life.

However the wrecks were not what concerned him, instead it was a number of dead bodies that were littered all over the ground. About half of them were completely charred over by the helicopter wreck and were therefore completely unidentifiable. The other bodies weren't as charred so there would be more forensic evidence for him to go over to help establish what exactly had happened here. However they were in horrific conditions. Some were missing their heads, others had large, dinner plate sized holes in several parts of their bodies, and one was even cut in half.

Batman broke himself out of his thoughts when he glanced over at his other teammates. Wonder Woman was doing a remarkable job at keeping herself appearing calm but it was obvious that she was disturbed by what she was seeing outside the cockpit window.

John Stewart, given his career in the United States Marine Corps before becoming a Green Lantern, remained stone faced even as Superman, Zatara and Hal Jordan saw what was obviously the aftermath of a military grade battle and were repulsed by it. True they had all seen the destruction that villains caused and sometimes a few innocents were caught in the crossfire but they hadn't had to deal with death in this manner before now.

Superman looked at each of the bodies with his telescopic and x-ray vision hoping to find at least one survivor amongst the group. Eventually he found what he was looking for and he looked over at Batman and told him that there was someone that was still alive down there. Batman quickly located a viable landing site nearby the battlefield and put the Javelin into VTOL mode and set about landing the transport.

Within moments the transport was on the ground and the boarding ramp had lowered. The group began to make their way out but stopped after a few seconds. About a dozen meters in front of them was a clearly wounded man lying up against a rock and was wearing a skull shaped helmet, a greatcoat and heavily damaged armor. At first he didn't seem to be alive. That changed when the individual weakly raised what was probably one of the strangest looking pistols that any of them had ever seen.

It was quite large for a pistol and looked as though it came from a science fiction movie. The top portion of it had a light blue glow to it and the barrel didn't look like it would fire conventional bullets as it was too large. Therefore Batman deduced it to be an energy weapon of some kind. The first one to speak up was Flash as he held his hands up in a placating gesture "Whoa, hold on we're not here to hurt you, we just want to help." The individual either didn't hear Flash or didn't care as he didn't lower his weapon but it was obvious that his wounds were making him have a difficult time keeping it level if the wavering hand was anything to go by.

Despite Flash's reassurances the individual didn't lower his weapon and kept it pointed at them for several seconds. Then he did something that none of them would have expected, he put the gun to his head. Batman's years of training and experience kicked in as he instinctively drew a batarang and threw it at the weapon. Unlike most batarangs, this one had weighted tips, which gave it a little bit more force when it was thrown at a target. This made it perfect for knocking heavy one handed weapons out of a criminal's grip.

Sure enough when the batarang impacted the weapon it was knocked right out of the man's hand and into the ground behind him. The individual then weakly reached for another weapon which was obviously another pistol but apparently his strength had left him and he quickly lost consciousness. The leaguers ran up to the wounded man and Batman immediately started checking for a pulse and thankfully he found one, although it was very weak.

Batman then reached for the helmet that the individual was wearing and removed it from his head. Much to almost everyone's evident shock and horror (Batman however just kept a neutral expression as usual), the man behind the skull like mask was just a teenage boy. He couldn't have been any older than seventeen at most, and yet he could very well have brutally murdered several of the soldiers whose bodies' were laying on the ground of the ravine in pieces. The boy's facial features almost looked like a battle hardened soldier. There were a number of partially faded scars on his face and his dark brown hair was completely shaved much like a member of the military's would be.

The Dark Knight of Gotham looked over at the rest of the group "Get him on board the Javelin and back to the Watchtower, move!" he ordered. Hal Jordan conjured a stretcher construct from his ring before Wonder Woman gently picked the unconscious boy up and lowered him onto the green colored construct, which was then levitated back into the Javelin. They needed to move quickly otherwise there was a very good chance that the boy wouldn't last another hour.

As they boarded the craft Batman contacted the reserve team's leader; Green Arrow and instructed him to have his team go down and secure the site and to not touch anything down there until he had finished going over the area. After Green Arrow gave an affirmative, Batman also instructed him to inform the medical unit aboard the Watchtower to be ready for incoming wounded.

* * *

To be continued


	3. Revelations

The Inquisitor

Chapter 3

Revelations

A/N: in this chapter you may notice a couple of characters that weren't featured in the Young Justice show but are featured in DC comics and the original DCAU. I thought that it would be kind of interesting to add them in.

Quick FYI when I watched Young Justice I found it very difficult to believe (to say the least) that a massive orbital facility such as the Watchtower didn't have any support personnel other than the handful of heroes that worked there. Sure some of them have powers and skill that would help keep the thing up and running but it would still be difficult to keep something of that size maintained with less than twenty people on board.

Also there will be several parts that are very, very similar to Lord-of-Change's fanfic, this was done with his or her permission. If you don't believe me then feel free to ask Lord-of-Change yourself.

* * *

-Watchtower, medical ward, three days after Dante's arrival-

* * *

Leslie Thompkins was in the medical ward of the Watchtower rechecking her current patient's condition. She had seen a lot of disturbing sights in her life. Many of these came from being a surgeon for well over twenty years in the city of Gotham, a city with one of the highest crime rates in the United States. She had seen the result of what villains like Bane, the Joker, Scarecrow, Victor Zsasz, Mr. Freeze and even several members of the mafia did to the people who lived in Gotham. What she saw taken aboard the Watchtower in that ring construct that was in the shape of a hospital stretcher was probably one of the worst.

It looked as though the boy had just been dragged from the frontlines of a war. And judging from his appearance and what she had managed to overhear from one or two of the other members of the Justice League, the boy very well could have been. He had several bullet wounds, one of which managed to nick an artery and had already lost a lot of blood as a result of that and his other wounds. In other words; if Batman and the others hadn't returned with the boy when they did, he probably wouldn't have made it.

The moment that the Javelin returned, Leslie and her medical team immediately went to work on helping the wounded boy. It had taken almost five hours on the operating table but doctor Thompkins and her surgical team had managed to stabilize their patient and patch up the artery and the bullet wounds he had received. During the surgery there were several times when the doctor thought that she would end up losing her patient, but somehow he always managed to bounce back from the brink either by sheer luck or through medical skill.

After the patient had at last been stabilized, she was finally able to examine the outward appearance of her patient as she had been so focused on saving his life that she had somehow managed to neglect noticing some of his more, disturbing features. Just one look and one could see that the boy's whole body was almost like a tapestry of many different scars.

There were many scars that covered numerous areas of the boy's skin. Most looked like the same kind of scars one would get after being shot, burned or stabbed, but there were others that appeared to have been done with something very sharp and precise, similar to a surgeon's scalpel. However the areas where the incisions weren't medical in nature. Instead it was more like someone had flayed off portions of his skin. That alone sent chills down Thompkins' spine. What kind of monster would do something like that to someone so young?

After the surgeries were finally finished Thompkins told the rest of the medical staff to inform both her and the Justice League if there were any changes, any at all, in the patient's current condition. Lord knew that Leslie would have many questions for him after he finally regained consciousness and judging by the league's reactions after she had told them what she had found upon examining her patient they probably would too. Many of them had looks of disgust and barely concealed anger at what must have been done to the boy.

Batman of course was able to keep his emotions in check but given how Leslie had known the man behind the mask for so long it was easy to tell what his emotions were no matter how well he tried to hide them. Leslie Thompkins was one of Bruce's oldest friends and confidants aside from Alfred, but this was to be expected as she and Bruce's father were best of friends while he was still alive.

While Leslie Thompkins may not have initially approved of Batman's methods and she still had some misgivings about them, she couldn't deny that he was making things better for the people of Gotham City. Innocent lives had been saved, corrupt city officials like the former police commissioner: Gillian Loeb had been sent to prison for their crimes and quite frankly, Batman made the city a relatively safer place to live in. Of course there were still criminals of course but at least now they were actually sent to prison instead of bribing the courts or making sure that any evidence or witnesses to their crimes were disposed of.

After stabilizing the patient Leslie had asked Batman what had happened to the boy and why in the hell he hadn't been taken to an actual hospital. The answer she received was just as disturbing as the scars that covered several parts of the boy's body.

Apparently he had destroyed a helicopter and brutally murdered several individuals that were apparently part of a mercenary unit with an energy weapon and something that looked like a cross between a chainsaw and a sword. Another detail that was just as odd was that he had also been found near the wreckage of some sort of transport that had several containers of futuristic weapons and medical supplies. It was then made clear to Leslie that the boy was part of, or at least partially affiliated with, some kind of military organization.

Doctor Thompkins was then broken out of her thoughts when she heard a beeping coming from one of the computers that was monitoring his brainwave activity and saw that his brain activity had gone from sleep to being awake. Thompkins immediately went for the nearest intercom in one of the walls and contacted the Justice League as they asked her to inform them the moment that the boy woke up.

The moment that she pushed the button she uttered two words into the other end of the intercom "He's awake." A voice on the other end told her that they would be right over.

* * *

The moment that Dante awoke he expected to be either at the side of the Emperor in the afterlife or still inside the Warp with the foul minions of Chaos attempting to claw at his mind and tempt him away from the Emperor's light with lies and other falsehoods. He hadn't however been expecting something like this; laying down on a relatively comfortable bed with his wounds completely bandaged and partially healed, making him wonder where he was, how long he was unconscious and how he had even gotten wherever he was now.

Dante then proceeded to examine his surroundings rather than just look at the bed he was in, perhaps there would be something that would tell him as to where he had been taken. There were two doors, both of which were more than likely locked down tight. There was a rather large mirror on the other end of the room that was most definitely one way glass. There were several machines nearby that were making periodic beeps and didn't look even remotely similar to most Imperial Medicae equipment and certainly not anything like the works of the Adepta Hospitallers.

The most telling was that this was not a bastion of the Imperium was that there wasn't even a single image of the Aquila anywhere in the room. The architecture of the place was much different than what he knew humans to use as well. At least that meant that he was more than likely _not_ in the hands of the forces of Chaos.

If he was indeed in a Chaos occupied area he doubted that they would have even bothered to treat his wounds let alone help them heal and would have instead probably would have just sacrificed him on the spot. Another thing that told him that he wasn't in the hands of the forces of Chaos was that the room didn't have anything that would even be remotely associated with the Ruinous Powers. This gave Dante a very small measure of relief but not much. In all likelihood Dante was either in the hands of the same group of humans that attacked him earlier although that was unlikely given how they had tried to kill him earlier, or he was in the hands of xenos.

Dante then heard the sound of footsteps coming from outside the room. The footsteps quickly grew closer and closer to the room that Dante was in and he knew that his captors/rescuers had finally decided to reveal themselves to him. Within a few short moments the door that led into the room opened and some of the strangest looking individuals that he had ever seen in his entire life walked through the door.

One was a man in a caped red and blue outfit that had an "S" stenciled into the chest portion of his little costume. The second was wearing a dark mask with two points on the top of the head on both sides, and an all-black garb with a long flowing cape. The man's entire outfit looked bat themed that vaguely resembled that of the Night Lords. However it was blatantly obvious that the man wasn't part of that particular traitor legion, given how he wasn't wearing their insignia nor was he wearing their power armor.

The third was a woman with shoulder length blonde hair and blue eyes. She wore fishnet tights, a blue jacket and what Dante assumed was a black piece of armor underneath. It was a strange getup that reminded him of some of the things he had seen in a Hive City club that he and Elias had once investigated almost three and a half years ago. Those were some rather strange times for Dante.

The final individual was something that made Dante want to get up and tear apart his visitors with his bare hands. It was a bald, green skinned xeno with almost glowing red eyes and a distinctly humanoid appearance. It wore a black uniform with – of course, considering what the other two were wearing – a blue cape. A wave of pure unbridled hatred and disgust for these people filled Dante. Dante's body stiffened and his hands clenched tightly into fists. These, _traitors_ dared to go against the decrees set by the Emperor and consort with xenos?

With an insurmountable amount of restraint he didn't even know he had, Dante resisted the urge to try and kill his captors. While it was his sworn and holy duty to destroy the enemies of the Imperium whenever possible he wasn't a fool in his mindset on how he went about doing it. He knew that it would be a fool's errand to try and take on four unknowns without any of his weapons. No it would be better if he were to wait, find a way out of this place and then somehow try to contact the Imperium. Then he would personally lead the charge in sending these traitorous curs into oblivion!

"I think you know why you're here," said the man in the nearly all black outfit in what Dante supposed what was supposed to be an intimidating tone but given what the young Inquisitor in training had been through, it was nothing. When Dante said nothing the one that was currently speaking continued, "When you were brought here we ran both your DNA and your face through every database on the planet and nothing came up. Because of this, as well the people you murdered and the weapons and equipment you were found with we have a number of questions we want you to answer and I suggest that you cooperate or you'll be locked up for a very long time."

Dante resisted the urge to scoff at the black clad man. Eventually he would eventually escape and find a way to contact the Ordo Malleus and from there they would purge these heretical scum from the face of the galaxy. For now though he would not tell them a thing, he wouldn't so much as utter a word to these heathens.

When they realized that he wasn't going to give them anything other than glaring at them the man with the red cape spoke up "Look you've been treated for your injuries and despite your actions towards those mercenaries, you're not in prison don't you think you should at least consider cooperating?"

It was at that point that Dante had to resist rolling his eyes, what servant of the Emperor would ever in their right mind even consider cooperating with their captors. Instead he just continued to glare at them, not uttering so much as a word in response to them.

It was then that Dante's captors realized that this interrogation would probably take a while before they would be able to get any answers out of the boy. They had no idea how correct that would be.

* * *

-Watchtower, One Week Later-

* * *

Close to a week had passed since the wounded boy was brought aboard the Watchtower. During the entire time he didn't say so much as a word to his captors no matter what it was they tried. Batman had attempted using his standard interrogation tactics but he didn't even so much as flinch, Superman tried to use his Boy Scout thing to try and build some decorum of trust, Wonder Woman tried to reach out to him as a fellow warrior. Green Arrow and the Flash were sent in at one point, but all of these were met with only a hate filled glare.

In between doing their duties as heroes and interrogating the subject, Batman and several other Leaguers examined the weapons and supplies that were found in the boy's possession. The first thing that caught everyone's eyes were the chainsaw/sword and the oversized pistols that the boy had on him when he was taken from that crash site.

The first pistol itself was a very complicated device and the ammunition that it carried was clearly meant to be as destructive as possible. Apparently once the rounds were fired they used a propellant that was put into the bullet that made them fly towards their target with additional speed, not too dissimilar to that of a rocket. Once they penetrated the armor of the target they exploded spherically which meant that when someone was hit they would probably end up having a wound that would be comparable to the size of a dinner plate that.

The other pistol was obviously an energy weapon, and one that if handled improperly, could end up killing the user. Apparently it fired superheated plasma at the target. This weapon suffered a serious design flaw, it overheated very quickly and if the manual venting wasn't activated it could very well end up leaking its ammunition. If that happened there was a great risk of ending up getting killed by the weapon's ammunition.

The weapon that drew the most attention however was the chainsaw/sword. The weapon was completely covered in blood and pieces of gore and looked like something that a psychopath with a penchant for slaughter would want to get his hands on. It was probably the most disturbing thing about this soldier that they had found so far and many wondered who would invent such a monstrous creation.

The weapon's 'teeth' however was perhaps its strangest feature. It was very clear that the metal was nearly monomolecular, making it razor sharp and unlike most monomolecular blades, it wasn't brittle. Instead the metal was made out of a nearly indestructible metal and was one that was nearly incapable of becoming dull. The metal itself wasn't made out of any known element on Earth. This discovery didn't answer any of the questions the League had for the boy and instead only raised further questions.

The last weapon to be examined was perhaps the most interesting but not in the way that the chainsaw/sword was. At first glance it just seemed to a rather large collapsible baton, similar to the ones that the police use in Gotham. However there was a small button on the hilt of the weapon and when it was activated the tip of the baton gave off a lot of electricity. The strangest part about it though was that when Martian Manhunter was near the device when it was giving off electricity he started to have intense, debilitating headaches but once the device was deactivated the Martian quickly felt more at ease.

With what happened to Martian Manhunter Batman deduced that the weapon was made to incapacitate or even kill those with psychic powers.

After they found out more about the weapons they started to ask their prisoner who created them and for what reason would they give weapons like those to a teenager. Of course, just like all the other times that the boy had been questioned he maintained nothing but a firm, hate filled glare.

Eventually the League had a meeting on what to do with the kid. It was obvious that they couldn't keep him there indefinitely as he had been technically acting in self-defense when those armed thugs came across him, if the forensic evidence that Batman had discovered was anything to go by.

During the latest meeting Batman proposed a rather controversial option towards getting answers out of the boy they had captured. Have Martian Manhunter read his mind. An argument erupted soon after he proposed the idea with one side wanting to use telepathy to find out everything about the boy while the other side thought that it was going too far. However it was soon decided that they would use J'onn's telepathy to learn all they could about the boy. J'onn was hesitant to say the least as he didn't want to invade another person's privacy but given that they were completely out of all other options, he reluctantly agreed.

Presently; Batman, Black Canary, Martian Manhunter and Green Arrow were walking at a steady pace towards the room where the boy had been held for the past several days. They knew that their guest wasn't going to be all that happy to see them if the past week had been anything to go by.

The door to the room where the boy was being kept opened up and they saw the teenager wearing the clothes that he had been given shortly after had awakened. Just as how he had been upon waking up, the boy remained silent and stoic towards them. Batman stepped forward and said "This is your last chance, tell us what we want to know or we will have Martian Manhunter use his psychic abilities to read your mind."

For a split second the boy's face lit up in both shock and horror before returning to its normal stoic expression. This was probably the first reaction that they had gotten out of the boy other than stoicism and glares that were filled with nothing but contempt and hatred.

"Do your worst, xeno vermin," the boy dared, his eyes narrowing and his voice snarling with pure and unbridled hatred. The Leaguers (save for Batman of course) looked shocked at the boy's sudden hostility towards the Martian. Batman however ignored the boy as he had anticipated such hostility and turned to Martian Manhunter and gestured for him to do what he had to do.

The Martian nodded his head and took a deep breath before letting it out. He had been hoping that the threat towards entering his innermost thoughts would make the boy cooperate but clearly that wasn't the case. Although J'onn was a psychic by nature he was reluctant to use his abilities on an unwilling participant outside of a life or death scenario. It was one of several parts of human society that he had adopted when he had arrived on Earth several years ago.

When Martian Manhunter entered the boy's mind it took him almost a minute to gain a foothold as their 'guest' seemed to have a very strong will, almost remarkably so. Eventually J'onn's experience, skill and power with his psychic abilities allowed him to make his way passed the boy's mental defenses and into his inner psyche, but even then the boy continued to fight him with everything he had. Because of this Martian Manhunter was only able to see some portions of their guest's memories but they were more than enough to make him regret ever entering his mind.

War, there was nothing but war on a scale that Martian Manhunter never thought possible. War was fought on countless worlds in the name of an Emperor and an Imperium of Man and against the foes of the Imperium. Streets, cities and homes drowned in rivers of blood, gore and mutilated corpses as these armies clashed endlessly with one another.

There was interrogation room where the boy and another member of a group known as the 'Inquisition', were all but torturing a suspected traitor for information regarding a group of heretics who dared to go against eh Emperor. Then came a vision of a bridge of a massive starship overlooking a great fleet of similarly sized ships that were in orbit around a planet very similar to Earth. A man of great authority ordering that something called an Exterminatus be performed, seconds later the world was burned to a lifeless husk as the fleet fired everything they had at the surface of the planet. After that memory finally passed, J'onn saw a sigil resembling an 'I' flashed in the Martian's vision for a brief second before the memories continued.

Within a few additional moments Martian Manhunter was able to access some of the more recent memories. There was another war one yet another world as a once beautiful city was laid to siege by a massive army to stop the construction of some kind of unholy gateway that lead into a realm of madness and pure evil, the Warp. A great battle was fought and the boy piloted the strange ship, a Stormraven if the memories were correct, giving air support to his mentor and his armies as they moved quickly through the city, killing all that were foolish enough to stand in their way.

They were too late though, the gate was activated and the boy, no, his name was Dante, Dante Kellan, acting against direct orders from his mentor as he flew his vessel into the gateway in the hopes that it would be destabilized once he entered it. Upon entering the construct he closed his eyes as the tormented whispers of the damned and the howls of monstrous Daemons filled his ears, attempting to sway him from his beliefs in the Emperor and towards something far more sinister and dark. He ignored them and soon the whispers and howls grew weaker and weaker before finally subsiding.

Then the images came faster and J'onn wasn't able to make all of it out but he saw the Dante's ship crashing, his fight with the mercenaries, him succumbing to the wounds he had sustained even as the Justice League's Javelin landed at the site. Dante waking up on the Watchtower and everything else that had passed from there until this very moment.

Martian Manhunter pulled out of the boy's mind, his entire body was visibly shaking in both shock and horror at the madness of the things he had just witnessed. The Martian felt numb as some of the memories he had seen played back in his mind and he felt a lump in his throat as though he was about to throw up.

"So much pain, so much horror, so much death…" J'onn mumbled in a soft and disturbed voice but it was more than loud enough for the others to hear what was said. Batman and the others looked at their friend and looks of concern cropped up on their faces. Of course Batman managed to keep his composure and asked "What did you see?"

Martian Manhunter didn't seem to really hear him "I, I need some time to process this, please, excuse me." And with that he left the room with the others tailing right behind him. All the while Dante never let up giving the Martian and his comrades a look of pure, unbridled hatred.

* * *

-Watchtower, Garden, several minutes later-

* * *

The Garden was the only part of the Watchtower that looked almost exactly like Earth's natural environment. It had been conceived as a way for the members of the Justice League to take some time off in a more natural setting without having to actually leave the watchtower. Many leaguers went there when they were on break to relax and enjoy the natural scenery for a while before heading back to their posts or the cities they were based in.

For Martian Manhunter it was a place that he would normally be able to find a sense of peace and tranquility whenever he felt troubled. Unfortunately the serenity of the garden was not something that was helping the Martian at the moment as all of his thoughts eventually turned to the horrors that he had seen inside the boy's mind. Although he had only seen several snippets of memories, as Dante's mental shields were ridiculously strong, it was still more than enough to shake the Martian to his core.

Knowing that he was as composed as he was ever going to get at the moment, Martian Manhunter called the heroes that had come with him to the interrogation to the Garden area where he would explain what it was he had seen to them. Within a few moments all of them had arrived and were right in front of Martian Manhunter waiting for him to tell them what it was he had seen in Dante's mind. Within a few moments Martian Manhunter was able to compose himself enough to speak to them calmly.

"My apologies for leaving the room so quickly but many of the things that I saw in that boy's mind were…" Martian Manhunter trailed off as he searched for the most appropriate word "…very disturbing to say the least."

They were all expecting J'onn to say something like that but it was still hard for them to swallow. Martian Manhunter always kept his composure, _always_, even in some of the most intense situations when the safety of the world itself was threatened he was normally quite calm and rational in regards to what was going on. Heck there was one time where the sun was almost extinguished thanks to an alien terrorist.

They managed to stop him of course but the terrorist was literally seconds away from causing a chain reaction that would have extinguished the sun. Despite the amount of pressure put on many members of the League, Martian Manhunter remained completely calm and collected throughout the whole ordeal

Eventually Martian Manhunter managed to speak of what he had found "The boy's name is Dante Kellan, he's human although his origin is not from Earth." That one had thrown everyone for a loop as humans only existed on one world, Earth. Despite numerous questions eating away at them all, they waited until Martian Manhunter was finished telling them about what he had found, and what he said next only confused and shocked them even further.

"Apparently he is a soldier in a military organization called the Inquisition which in turn answers to someone known only as the Emperor who rules what he refers to as The Imperium of Man." It was then that Green Arrow spoke out, demanding why they would allow kids to join the military and the answer was something that made their opinion of the Inquisition sink even lower than it had already.

"He wasn't allowed in, the Inquisition recruited him after an unspecified incident that I wasn't able to gain access to. The boy's mental defenses are quite formidable and if I attempted to push any harder I ran the risk of rendering him brain-dead or even killing him.

Now as I was saying, the Inquisition wields near unlimited power, they can use whatever means they deem to be necessary to complete their mission which usually involves rooting out traitors and heretics in this Imperium. Their methods can range from using torture to gather information from someone suspected of treason to destroying entire worlds to keep whatever heresy was on those planets from spreading to other planets."

The moment that J'onn mentioned the Inquisition destroying whole planets Superman felt his hands tighten into fists. Given his feelings in regards to the destruction of Krypton, this was a very, very sensitive topic for the man of steel. If anyone were to _willingly_ destroy entire planets along with all of the inhabitants that lived there then they were truly evil.

Eventually Martian Manhunter finished telling them of how Dante had arrived on Earth and what exactly happened between him and those mercenaries. However they still lacked the full story as Dante was able to keep the telepathic alien out of much of the majority of his memories and even the ones that Martian Manhunter did managed to access he wasn't able to see very much of them.

While these answers did answer several of their questions it also asked countless new ones that they would have to find answers for later. Right now they needed to find this 'Inquisition' and put a stop to these inhuman acts they were performing on people. However there was one matter that required their immediate attention; what were they to do with their 'guest'?

* * *

-Dante's quarters/cell, one hour later-

* * *

Dante didn't know how long he had been sitting there since that xeno filth violated his mind and quite frankly he didn't really care. The Inquisitor in training was in a rage. Dante knew for the past several days that these fools had been growing impatient with him, especially how he wasn't responding to any of their questions or interrogation tactics. Instead he did as he had been trained to do in the event of his capture by hostile forces, say nothing to no one no matter what happened.

However it seemed as though Dante's training had been all but rendered moot when that insufferable xeno was brought in and forcefully entered his mind. Dante had hoped that he would be able to deny these heathens any information regarding himself or the Inquisition to his dying breath, which he had initially assumed would have come when they had last entered the room. Although he'd been hoping for that to be the case, those traitors used something that Dante had been hoping wasn't in their arsenal, a Psyker.

His earlier sense of fulfillment at denying the enemy the information they so wanted was dashed when they decided to use this 'Martian Manhunter's' psyker powers to forcefully enter his mind and take the information they wanted from him. Now he had failed, and the enemy now had access to information, granted he did manage to prevent them from getting any of the more vital intelligence regarding Inquisitor Elias' activities and anything else regarding the Imperium. But still, he shouldn't have allowed those bastards from getting what they wanted from him at all, even if it was just common knowledge about the Imperium's great military.

Now Dante wondered why he was even alive, they had what they wanted. Didn't they? Did they leave him alive to torment him with the knowledge that he had failed in his duties to the Imperium or were going to keep pushing him for more information regarding the Imperium?

Well if either was the case then Dante would make sure that his resolve would never falter. He would fight them to his very last breath if that was what it took. These fools would have to pry the information away from his lifeless husk before he gave them anything that could prove to be vital to his mentor or the activities of the Inquisition.

The moment that those thoughts entered his mind, the door leading into his cell opened and three members of the so-called "Justice League" stepped in. He recognized them as Green Arrow, Aquaman and the Flash if he remembered correctly when the fools decided to give him their names when they tried to interrogate him. The one known as Aquaman spoke in an authoritarian voice, as though he was someone of any real importance "You will come with us, now."

Realizing that he had little choice Dante stood up from where he was sitting on the edge of the bed and kept his head held high. He wouldn't show these bastards any sign of weakness, now or ever if he had anything to say about it. Dante followed Aquaman to wherever it was he was being taken to while the other two who were accompanying him stayed behind him.

It was a rather typical formation for escorting a prisoner, as no one wanted that prisoner to enact a spontaneous escape attempt. Of course when the Inquisition did something like this with a prisoner they usually had as many bolt and lasguns pointed at the prisoner's head as possible. Eventually they reached their destination. It was a rather large meeting room with a crescent shaped table in the center of it. All of the seats on the table were taken by various 'heroes' that were members of the Justice League.

At the head of the table was batman who stood up from his seat as soon as he saw Dante and his 'escorts' and spoke up. "You're name is Dante Kellan, apprentice Inquisitor to the Ordo Malleus of the Inquisition." It was obvious that this was more of a statement than it was a question and so Dante simply kept his mouth shut.

At this moment one of the other Leaguers stood up, a man with light brown hair wearing a green outfit that had an emblem of a lantern on the chest section. "The Green Lantern Corps maintains peace and order throughout most of the galaxy but this is the first time we've heard of an Imperium or an Inquisition but when we do find out where they're located, we will take measures to stop this Inquisition."

It was then that Dante almost burst out laughing at the sheer idiocy of that statement. Were these people completely mad or were they simply stupid? Either way, Dante felt the need to at least inform them of their foolishness, mainly to put at least a small sense of fear into their hearts before they fought against some of the Imperium's finest warriors. He let out a loud yet brief snort in order to get the attention of everyone in the room.

"Stop us you say, _you_ disgusting heretics actually think you can stop _us_? The Inquisition is one of the most feared and respected forces known throughout the Imperium of Man, an empire of over a millions of worlds, with millions of fleets and trillions of soldiers, all of which are ready to fight for the Emperor till their dying breath. From atop the Golden Throne on holy Terra itself the almighty Emperor will reach out with his glorious might and reduce your Justice League to nothing but ashes. We are an unassailable force and we will destroy you as easily as a mere ant is crushed by a boot."

Strangely enough, Dante's speech didn't inspire the fear that he had been banking on. Instead everyone else in the room looked at each other somewhat confused at something he just said. Superman stood up and asked "When you say 'Terra' do you mean Earth?" he asked.

Dante cocked a brow in confusion but nodded an affirmative "That is a very old name, but yes I do mean Earth."

Batman then punched in a few commands on the console that was on the table and a holographic image of a planet came up. "Dante this is the planet the Watchtower currently orbits, it's the only planet that contains human life, it's known as Earth or as you call it Holy Terra."

Dante was completely shocked at this new revelation. This was perhaps the first time in several years he couldn't find any words to make a response to a claim a heretic mentioned. It took several moments but Dante managed to gather his thoughts and suddenly it all became clear to him. They were trying to deceive him, to make him stray from the Emperor's light, why and for what reason he didn't know but he wouldn't allow these fools to taint him.

"You're lying," he said bluntly as he regained his composure and his face returned to being stoic. Batman arched a brow "We're not lying, this is Earth and the Imperium and Inquisition you serve don't exist here." This continued for a few moments longer before Batman asked "What reason would we have to lie to you?"

It was at this point that Dante resisted the near irresistible urge to roll his eyes at the caped crusader. Why should he even put an ounce of trust in these people, especially after they allowed a xeno psyker into his mind?! "You used that xeno psyker to forcefully enter my mind, you speak of declaring war against the Imperium and the Inquisition. Why wouldn't you attempt to deceive the enemy?" he asked incredulously.

Batman narrowed his eyes further to give the infamous 'batglare' that had intimidated so many but Dante wasn't so much as fazed by such a thing. After all he had seen far more fearsome things than a simple glare. The other members of the Justice League were very surprised that someone so young was able to stand up to Batman as he was perhaps the most intimidating member of the Justice League.

"We aren't trying to go to war with anyone, we want to protect Earth from a clearly dangerous threat." Dante cocked a brow and looked at the assembled heroes "Xenos protecting humans? That seems very unlikely given their nature of corruption and treachery." He knew that this would probably be considered an insult be quite frankly Dante found that he didn't really give a damn.

His words seemed to have the desired effect as the entirety of the group that was sitting there was completely disgusted by what Dante had just stated. It didn't matter to him though, if the ignorant refused to listen to those enlightened then they would pay the price.

The first person to react was Captain Marvel who stood up from his chair with a look of pure rage on his face "Hey just because you've run into some pretty bad aliens before doesn't mean that they're all like that!" he yelled. One of the other leaguers, the sorcerer Zatara if Dante remembered correctly put his hand on his shoulder, in an attempt to stop the fool from doing anything stupid.

"That is where you are wrong, betrayal is a natural part of every xeno race in existence and in the words of the Emperor they will never be anything but vile and untrustworthy abominations who seek to enslave mankind and stop us from claiming what rightfully belongs to us. The only thing they will ever deserve is extinction."

If the Justice League wasn't completely disgusted before then they certainly were now. Captain Marvel actually looked like he wanted to leap from his spot at the table and confront Dante face to face but he managed to restrain himself, but just barely.

"And just what gives your 'Emperor' the right to make claims such as that?!" demanded Wonder Woman, questioning the boy's rather disturbing ideals. Dante's response was swift and without any doubts.

"He is the father and savior of humanity, he is the one true deity that guides all of mankind towards our rightful places as the rulers of the galaxy."

For a moment everyone was at a loss for words and they all wondered what kind of society the boy came from that would advocate such actions of genocide. The only one who managed to remain calm or at least appear to remain calm "Regardless of your ideals we aren't lying, this is Earth and your Imperium doesn't exist here."

Dante rolled his eyes once again. How long did these fools plan on using such idiotic tactics on him? "As I have stated numerous times now, your lies won't fool me, in the forty first millennium there will never be peace so long as the enemies of the Emperor still draw breath."

It was then that everyone else in the room looked as though they had realized something important. At first Dante was a little confused by their reaction, did they not even know the proper date? "Dante this is the twenty-first century," said Superman.

Of course Dante completely denied almost everything that the Justice League was trying to tell him. Batman calmly typed in a few commands onto a nearby console and soon a holographic representation of the planet came up, "Well then, if you won't take our word for it, then we'll just have to show you the truth."

For the next two hours Dante was shown history, news reports and other documentations that proved beyond a reasonable doubt that he was in the twenty-first century. For the first time in years Dante was rendered completely speechless and it took him a minute for him to regain his composure.

"How-how is this even possible?" he asked not sure if he would even like the answer. Superman gave the boy a shrug as he answered "It's possible that you're from an alternate reality or you arrived via time travel. Perhaps this 'Warp' might have had something to do with it."

Dante had to admit that was in the realm of possibility, even the Imperium had known about the Warp for over ten millennia it still wasn't fully understood. The only ones who were truly capable of understanding such a place, were the entities that resided there and only the damned would ever even think to ask those creatures for any sort of help.

Before Dante could come up with a response there was a loud beeping noise coming from the direction of the table that the Justice League was sitting down at. The holographic display changed from a hologram of Holy Terra to what Dante assumed to be some sort of news broadcast. There was a bird's-eye view of several large buildings that were surrounded by several white and blue colored vehicles with bright red and blue lights that were flashing at a fast rate.

Soon a female voice came over the speakers "This is Vicky Vale live from directly above Gotham Academy. Just a few minutes ago we received word that the school was swarmed by a large group of terrorists who have since fortified it and taken a large number of students hostage…" the woman trailed off for a moment before she spoke up again "We've just received a live video feed from the man believed to be the leader of the group."

The screen then changed from the view of the school to that of a man wearing combat fatigues and a ski mask, inside what looked like a stage. He held in his right hand a decently sized pistol and directly to his left were two more men that wore similar outfits. The other two terrorists were restraining a man in his late thirties or early forties who was wearing the same kind of outfit that one would expect a geeky teacher to wear.

The apparent leader of the group then spoke "I'm gonna make this perfectly clear to everyone in the area, we only want _one_ thing. We want the skull masked freak who wasted my boys in the Nevada desert. If we don't see him in the next hour, we're going to start killing hostages, starting with the kids, and just to show you I'm not bluffing…" he trailed off as his loyal men brought the whimpering teacher over to him.

The teacher then started to plead for his life, tears of fear and desperation streaming down his cheeks but the terrorist leader paid him no heed and instead just put the gun up to the man's forehead and squeezed the trigger. A loud bang filled the air as the man's begging ceased and his body went limp. The man's corpse was then carried out of the room with a large bullet hole in his head by the two guards. With that done the terrorist leader then turned to face the camera again.

"There will be no room for negotiation, our demands are final. If anyone tries to call us up before we see that bastard we'll start executing people once every twenty minutes. And before any _heroes_ get the bright idea of coming down here to save the day, know this, we have dozens of bombs placed throughout major population centers in the city and inside the school itself. If we so much as perceive a hint of your presence _at all_, then we'll start detonating them, killing quite a few innocent people in the process."

The man then looked at his watch for a moment before looking back at the camera. "One last thing, I suggest that you hurry and find Skull Face, the first student is going to die in the next fifty-nine minutes and thirty-three seconds."

* * *

To be continued


End file.
